Though he had to thank "thousands," he thanked co-producer George Clooney (who quietly, classily kept to himself) onstage and his crying wife. (Aww!)

"Ben is our producer on the film, and he's also our director," Heslov said. "I thought it would be awkward if Ben thanked himself, so I am going to thank Ben."

When Affleck took the mic, he was clearly overwhelmed.

"Thank you very much, I want to acknowledge Steven Spielberg, who is a genius, I want to acknowledge eight great films that belong up here," he gushed.

"I thank everyone in the movie, on the movie, I want to thank Canada, I want to thank Iran ... I want to thank my wife, who I don't normally associate with Iran, for working on our marriage," he stammered, garnering (see what we did there?) laughter from the audience, including his beloved Jennifer Garner.

"I never thought that I would be back here," Affleck said earnestly before sharing his life lessons. "You have to work harder than you think you possibly can. You ca't hold grudges, even if it's hard -- you can't hold grudges. No matter how you get knocked down in life, you gotta get back up."

Before getting the 'Jaws' theme and bursting into tears, Affleck thanked his tots. He did all of this without doing the DX "suck it" motions or flipping the bird to the Academy or yelling the tagline from the movie, ARGOF---YOURSELF.